SAO, a survivors tale
by stargateoracle
Summary: My first fanfic story based on the world of SAO, with OC although established characters do appear. When food and a roof over your head mean life and death in a game its only a matter of time before you push on to do more.
1. Beginnings

I wont bore you with the details of how I got into this mess. From what I heard afterwards it was worldwide news when Sword Art Online, the worlds first full dive MMO, became a game of life and death for the 10,000 people stuck inside.

For the first few days after learning I was stuck in this game I don't think I left the inn using the few hundred col I had earned after first logging in to pay for the room and eventually food to eat after the hunger finally got to me. As I woke up on the 4th day a notification window popped up in front of me telling me I did not have enough col left to pay for another night.

Knowing that without food the virtual hunger in the game would eventually cause my HP to deplete and kill me I realised that I now had no choice but to venture out of the town of beginnings and risk my life fighting the various beasts for col and items that could eventually protect me better than the starting gear I still wore. Leaving the town through the north east exit I started down the path to see what this world had to offer. sticking to the path seemed the safest option at first knowing that it would lead me to another town sooner or later but knowing that col and exp were important to surviving right now I had to veer off the path to hunt for the mobs that would be either my immediate salvation or doom.

It took me some time to find an area on the vast grasslands that surround the starting town which wasn't already full of parties of players killing every mob as it spawned. After an hour or two of walking I approached the edge of a large forest, opening my map window I saw I was close enough that it now showed up as Horunka forest. Figuring that any mobs within the forest would probably be to high a level for me at the moment I skirted along a safe distance from the edge of the forest and soon came across a small pack of Frenzy Boar's. Knowing that unless I attacked one of the large blue furred animals they wouldn't be a threat to me I walked closer to the pack of maybe half a dozen Boar. Drawing my small sword I raised it up above and behind my shoulder and pointed it toward the boar I had chosen as my first target.

After a second or so I felt the power of the basic sword skill, Slash, activate and thrust the weapon forward letting the weapon skill system of the game direct the motion of the blade and leaving a white streak of light in its path. The HP of the boar instantly dropped going from green to orange to red stopping with maybe 10 percent of its health remaining. The delay aspect of using a sword skill kept me rooted to the spot for a second giving the boar a chance to turn towards me but luck was on my side for even as it swung its great hairy head towards me to tear at my body with its tusks I was able to take a step back before swinging my sword down onto the top of its head. The boars HP bar dropped to nothing and seconds later the boar exploded into shining shards of prismatic light that quickly faded. With a ping a window opened directly in front of me showing me my gains. 24xp, 30 col. 2 pieces of mangy fur and a boar tusk. I accepted my rewards and moved onto the rest of the pack. As the day drew on I continued to map the northwest and northern fields almost travelling as far as the north-eastern lake which as I didn't get close enough my map didn't tell me the name of. Deciding to take a slightly different route back to town I headed across the grassland towards the path that I figured would take me to the northern gate as I knew a stall not far from there where I would be able to buy some food and a couple potions. My health wasn't to much of a concern to me at the moment as despite a few lapses in concentration where I had let a boar or two get in a hit my HP had not even turned orange but knowing that I wanted to head into the forest tomorrow it seemed a prudent thing to be prepared.

My initial fear from being trapped in this game, knowing that death was around almost every corner, had subsided during the day. My success with the low level mobs outside the forest had shown me that I could handle myself in this world. Now I had a mission for myself. I would join the players on the front lines and help clear this game. But to do that I knew I couldn't play solo for long. it may be viable for the first floor or two but before long it would be to dangerous so I would have to find others, maybe a guild, to join. I knew from the game manual I had read before logging in that the guilds function wouldn't be locked until the third floor and I was confident I could survive until then, but maybe I shouldn't be keeping to myself so much. that would be another thing for me to try and do which in the real world had always been the hardest thing. Socializing. Being a natural loner and awkward around people, well when sober anyway if I had a few drinks I didn't mind anywhere near as much. Still I could always put that off until after the first or second village I reasoned with myself, better to wait and find people also trying to be at the front than held back by people who couldn't progress enough to get to the front lines.


	2. Meeting a rat and pushing forward

As I approached the item vendor I saw a cloaked girl turning away from the NPC with three pairs of whiskers painted on her face.

"Hi, I'm Argo" she said with a smile as she saw me. Her brown cloak hid much of her features but beneath the hood I could see a fringe of brown hair stopping above a pair of brown eyes that hinted at a person with many secrets.

"Hi Argo" I replied, "The names Grim" I added holding out my hand. She reached out and took my hand shaking it lightly. "So how are you coping with all of this?" I asked using my now free hand to gesture at the world around us.

"Better than some, but if you want to know anything more than that it will cost you" she answered with another smile but seeing the puzzled look on my face she explained "I'm an information dealer, you want to know anything from me I will tell you what I know or find out if I don't. But everything has its price"

"ok…" I replied wondering what I could afford to ask before it hit me "where is the best sword I can get on this level then?"

"ha-ha!" she laughed at me "slow down Grim-chan I can take all your money if you want but have you not checked the free level guidebook from the item merchant yet?"

"guidebook?" I asked puzzled "since when do NPC's sell walkthroughs for an MMO?"

"First it's not a walkthrough its just a guide, with all known quest locations and map data from some, uh.. sources of mine so you will know where you are going. Not to mention mob locations and tactics"

I looked round to the NPC vendor wondering why I hadn't noticed such a valuable, free item for sale before and when I looked back to Argo I was just in time to see the cloaked figure leaping over a tall wooden fence at the back of a nearby alleyway and out of sight.

Heading over to the NPC I opened up the trade menu and started by selling all the items dropped by the Feral Boar's and Dire Wolves. Briefly considering keeping the mangy fur and leather scrap items to raise up a leatherworking skill but quickly dismissed the idea and sold them all for more Col than I had thought they would be worth. With my inventory now free of items I selected the free guidebook along with a couple minor potions and several crusty bread rolls to help with the hunger pangs that were slowly becoming difficult to ignore.

Walking through the town of beginnings, following the curve of the outer streets just inside the town wall, I kept an eye out for an inn I could stay at for the night and not long before I reached the north-western gate I found one with a brightly painted sign above the door 'Fortunes Bounty'. Going inside I paid for one night in the room and headed up to the first floor and the room offered to me. Collapsing into a chair I felt the exertions of the day finally take its toll on me and feeling physically drained I could no longer hold back the floodgates and for the first time since being in the game I cried. I wasn't sure if I was crying from the horror of being stuck in this death game or because I had finally decided to take control of my future and help get everyone out but when I finally finished crying I felt so much better as if a weight had been lifted from my shoulders. Smiling to myself at the feeling I quickly ate one of the bread rolls while reading the quests section of the guidebook and set the alarm on the system menu to wake me at 5am. Leaving early I would be able to get to the forest by mid morning setting my sights on a quest mentioned in the book that could get me one of the best swords on the floor, an Anneal Blade. A one handed sword with the potential of being upgraded 8 times if you could find a good enough blacksmith. I lay back on the bed and read the guidebook from cover to cover before I fell asleep adding the map data to what I had already collected and marking key quest locations ready for some serious grinding.

To my surprise the path to Horunka forest wasn't as quiet as I had expected, in the low morning light I could see groups of players on the grassland hunting the packs of boar that had respawned in abundance now that the majority of the people hunting them had either moved on or returned to town for the night. As I ran on the light began to increase signalling the start of another day in Aincrad, with the early morning light illuminating the forest before me. I slowed down as I reached the edge of the forest, if this was anything like the mmo's I had played when I was younger then I was going to have to be careful in here with more aggressive mobs likely to attack me first unlike the otherwise passive boars in the fields.

It turned out that more people than I realised were already in the forest so I didn't really need to worry to much about hostile mobs though I did get a bit of a fright when one guy with blue hair, metal armour and a shield charged across the path in front of me in pursuit of a wasp like creature with a vicious looking stinger currently spinning away from him at high speed presumably from a defensive swipe of the blue haired 'knights' sword. The rest of the forest was mostly uneventful although I did manage to get quite a bit of mangy fur and leather scraps from the wolves that were a lot more common in the woods than they had been on the plains. Eventually around midafternoon I emerged from the forest slightly richer and up to level 3. After my long trip I decided to walk past the small house on the edge of the village where I knew the quest was and headed into Horunka village itself to look for an inn to rest up and try some different food to the crusty rolls I had been eating for almost a week now.

As I entered the village however something was immediately wrong to me, other players were here already but most of them were in a state of panic and those that weren't were unconscious on the floor. I rushed towards the nearest person who was checking on another player but before I could say anything they gasped with shock and crumpled to the floor next to the person they had been checking on. Starting to feel the fear rising up inside me I quickly looked around for an inn, if I was going to pass out as well I wanted to make sure I would be safe from whatever was going to happen next. As I ran I could hear people crying out, asking other people what was happening often as either that person collapsed or they did themselves. I'm pretty sure I heard one person saying something about it being a virus, but whatever it was I knew I couldn't stop. Turning a corner I saw a sign for a small inn called 'Reki's Rest'. Bursting through the door I heard the customary greeting from the NPC innkeeper as I felt my knees buckle beneath me and my view turned black. The last thing I remembered was the floor rushing up to meet me.


	3. Quest for the Anneal Blade

As I came to I looked around me in the vain hope that maybe all this had been sorted out. Freedom from a game which had already claimed hundreds of lives. I was hoping to see my familiar bedroom with my computer and various game related posters half hidden behind piles of DVDs and blurays but I was not in luck. The wooden floor I lay on did not belong in my bedroom nor did the middle aged man stood behind a counter with a green NPC icon above his head. Climbing to my feet I used my hand to open the menu and saw that it had been four hours since I had passed out. Wondering outside I saw more players walking around now and a few regaining consciousness and getting up. I walked over to a young woman with shoulder length brown hair and an iron rapier and helped her up.

"Thanks" she mumbled as she pulled up the hood to her cloak.

"Do you have any idea what just happened?" I asked not really expecting an answer but trying to start some kind of dialogue with this woman.

"we're in hospital now I would think" she replied looking straight at me with her piercing blue eyes "If I was in charge of things on the outside I would have every player moved to a place where the bodies can be kept alive and looked after straight away, but I guess it would have taken a few days at least to sort out enough bandwidth for people in each place." She stopped and tilted her head as she smiled and looked down. "I'm sorry, my names Silver" she said holding out her hand "I'm known for over thinking things sometimes but I've been expecting this since that announcement from Akihiko Kayoba on launch day' she continued.

'Well I'm Grim" I replied shaking her hand "and I cant say I had given it much thought but it seems logical that's what happened. But how come we weren't all killed when the connection was lost?"

"The Nerve gear has a battery pack in it." She replied "my guess is its designed to set off the microwave pulse when the battery gets to low but Kayoba must have allowed enough time on the batteries for us to be moved somewhere we can be looked after properly or his world would have been empty well before we clear the game."

I guess your right" I said after thinking it over for a few moments. "so what are your plans for surviving this game then?" I asked

"Well I was going to check out the stalls in the village before heading out towards the labyrinth tower and trying to level up on the way," she answered "you?"

"Oh, well pretty much the same but there's a quest on the edge of town I wanted to check out first"

"hmm, well maybe I will see you on the front lines sometime, maybe even party up to explore the labyrinth if your quick enough" she said with a smile. Before I could reply she had spun round on the spot and started walking away "See ya around Grimmy" she called with a wave of her hand. I watched her walk away for a minute before turning to the path which would lead me to the quest I wanted. The outer edge of the village where the cottage I was looking for was maybe 50 yards away from the edge of the forest with the boundary of the safe zone being somewhere in between so I didn't have to worry about fighting any mobs in the evening twilight. Not that I had much to worry about with myself being level three now and most of the mobs here still being levels one or two. Double checking my location on my map I opened the white wooden gate and walked up the short path to the front door of the cottage. As I opened the door I took saw a neat but sparse room with a single door leading to another room. As I looked around a female NPC, wearing an apron and her light brown hair in a bun showing a few streaks of grey at the sides, approached me from the kitchen holding a cup. Behind her was a small iron pot on a stove bubbling away contentedly.

"Good evening brave warrior" she said as she walked closer towards me "I don't have anything to offer you but a drink of water if you have come to me for respite after journeying through the nearby forest" Looking again at the pot bubbling away I wondered why she said she had nothing to offer, but then it was probably the woman's food. I thanked her for the water and began to drink it when I heard a coughing noise from behind the closed door. I looked over and for a second I almost dismissed it until I remembered that in SAO you couldn't hear through a closed door unless your eavesdropping skill was high enough. Looking back at the NPC in front of me I saw her glance at the door as well though she did it with a slightly exaggerated look of concern.

"Is everything ok in there?" I asked gesturing towards the door and as I said those words a small ! Appeared above the woman's head.

"Its my daughter" she explained "she has been ill for some time now and none of the medicines in our little village and been able to help her at all." She paused for a moment and wiped her eyes "I have spent almost everything I have trying to find a cure for my daughter and the only thing that has a chance of helping her are the ovules of a plant that grows in the forest. If you could get me a little nepent ovule then I would be so grateful, I know its not much but you could have my late husbands sword. Its been passed down through the family for generations but my daughter and I have no use for it so its yours if you can help us"

"Of course" I answered handing back the now empty cup "I will go right now" I finished as I saw my quest log update itself and the ! Above the woman's head turned into a ?. As I reached the end of the path I looked towards the forest. In the now late evening twilight it looked very dark under the canopy of those trees and I really didn't fancy starting my quest in the dark. It wasn't that night time ever really got to dark in an MMO as there was always more than enough light to see, but sometimes developers would throw in a twist with larger groups of enemies or extra night themed enemies spawning. Turning towards the village I could see that there were still a few NPC owned stalls still open so I headed over to the armour merchant to see if I could get any upgrades. Twenty minutes later I was back in the inn I had collapsed in earlier today but this time with a paid room. It was the standard fare as inns seemed to go here with a bed, small desk and a chair. All I really needed it for was a safe place to sleep so that didn't matter. Selecting my menu I began to equip my new items. First was the light bronze chest plate followed by my new sturdy leather boots and light bronze bracers. It had been tempting for me to buy a new sword as well but a quick visit to a nearby blacksmith had its durability points back up to full so it should last long enough now to finish the quest I had just taken on. Setting my alarm for an early start I lay on the slightly to hard inn bed. After that afternoons blackout I wasn't sure if I would be able to get to sleep very quickly but within minutes I was fast asleep

The next morning I rose with my alarm and stretched feeling the added weight of my new armour. It wasn't the heaviest armour available but I figured it would give me more protection than the starting gear I'd still been wearing but the extra weight shouldn't slow me down to much. Playing solo you needed every bit of speed and protection you could get, minimising damage taken between sword skills and increasing how many you could use by reducing the delay effect. Checking my map I saw that the area I should be able to find the little nepent plant was a sizeable area near the centre of the forest. Once I had had a quick breakfast I left the inn and set off towards the forest at a brisk jog. It took a little over an hour to get to the spawn zone indicated by the map and I considered myself lucky I had only needed to fight a few dire wolves on my way here. Now I was in the right area I started looking around for small plants that registered as potential quest items. Walking around some bushes I jumped back drawing my sword. In front of me standing at maybe a meter and a half tall now moving towards me on writhing green roots was a large plant like creature. Looking above it I saw the red diamond indicating it was a hostile mob and below that the name, little nepent.

"Oh boy" was all I could mutter to myself as I dodged out of the way of one of its whip-like appendages this wasn't going to be a simple gather quest it was a proper hunt with the odds of the item I needed dropping likely to be pretty low. Darting forward I attacked the creature with full strength and the sword skills at my command swiftly defeating it for a small reward of col and exp but no item drops. Keeping my sword in hand I continued onward, more warily now, searching for more. By day three I had replaced my metal chest plate and bracers with heavy leather ones. The lighter gear helped my keep my agility high and with the materials I was getting whenever I ran into dire wolves I was able to use the leatherworking skill to repair my armour without having to return to town as much. Day six was my lucky break where after having lunch with a party of other players also on the same quest I chanced upon a little nepent with a large flower upon its head. It was a quick fight, the exp I had gained over the last week had raised me to level four well above the average for the area and soon the nepent was exploding into a thousand shards of light. I almost jumped for joy when I saw that the quest item had finally dropped for me and after double checking it was in my inventory I started to head out of the forest. It was a quiet trip back, with the amount of players trying for the quest most of the mobs were killed pretty quickly but I still listened for any noises as I went. Over the last week I had met plenty of others trying for the sword and some had been in the forest even longer than me so the last thing I wanted was to annoy any players who hadn't enjoyed the same amount of luck I just had. Eventually I exited the forest and saw the small cottage ahead of me, increasing my speed to a job I jumped the little white gate and landed halfway up the path. with a few more steps I was at the door and walked in. Not much had changed since I was here six days ago except the woman was not in the room, though the door that had been shut before was now ajar. Crossing the room I pushed the door open and saw the woman sat beside a bed with a young girl lying in it. The girl's shoulder length black hair was splayed out on the pillow and her face was the palest I had ever seen on anyone in the game, NPC or otherwise. I opened my inventory and selected the nepent ovules and held them out to the woman as they materialised into my hand. The woman gratefully took them from me and walked through the door behind me thanking me repeatedly. Crossing to the kitchen she put them into the same bubbling pot I had noticed on my last visit, a small bar appeared above it filling in seconds before the woman dipped in a cup and walked back to the room with her sick daughter. Following her back inside the bedroom I watched as she gave the medicine to her daughter, I found myself smiling along with the mother as colour returned to the little girls face.

"Thank you so much brave warrior" she said as she looked up at me "Please accept this sword as a sign of our gratitude and use it with the same honour you have shown us here"

In front of me a small window opened showing quest completion, exp gain, col and the item I had been working for all week.

The Anneal Blade.

Now my journey through the game, to join the players who would defeat the bosses on each floor and free us all from this game.


End file.
